Ed Miliband rocks!

A surprising headline perhaps for a blog not known for its socialist credentials. But embattled Labour leader Ed "Gromit" Miliband looks like he's seen the light. OK, it may be only the light at the end of the tunnel marked "you are a loser" but I'm all for consensus if it's correct.

To what am I referring? What possible spark of genius could Oxbridge graduate who's never had a proper job Ed "I'm down with t'workers me" Miliband have produced to have your blogmeister smiling? Well he clearly reads this blog and as a result, has been inspired to agree that public sector workers are overpaid. Yep, you read right. He said that in order to protect jobs, pay rates should fall. This is what some of us have been saying for ages. It's right for two reasons: first that if demand for labour falls then so should the price of labour, i.e. wages and salary levels. The so-called public sector  "wage freeze" is a move in the right direction but it's not enough. So second, it's not enough partly because, as has been regularly pointed out, public sector pay has risen so much in recent years that it needs to come back to earth even before you start a demand-led reduction. The attempts to reduce the cost of public sector pensions are of course another part of this, and quite right too.

Wages are notoriously "sticky downwards" which is why when times are hard, unemployment rises by more than is necessary. And there's no doubt that there's a lot more of this stickiness in the public sector than in the private.

So well done Ed. You may be upsetting your union paymasters but I think you have made the right call that if you're going to upset anyone, it's better to upset them than the electorate. By the way, you're also right to oppose Scottish independence. Next stop, Labour calls for a withdrawal from the EU, the ending of national pay agreements in the public sector (the sooner the better for that one) and abolition of the 50% tax rate!